<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Gotcha by klfette</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23649085">Gotcha</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/klfette/pseuds/klfette'>klfette</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Community (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Autism Spectrum, Canon Autistic Character, Character Study, Fluff, Gen, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:06:45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>353</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23649085</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/klfette/pseuds/klfette</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Just some stuff abt Troy and Abed's relationship, bc I was reminded of my old special interest with Community being added to netflix. Can be read as platonic, but know that they love eachother.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Troy Barnes/Abed Nadir</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>153</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Gotcha</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Am I projecting? Absolutely. Do I feel any shame? Not at all.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Abed was diagnosed with autism at the age of 13. It made sense. The symptoms all fit. So he shrugged, and carried on with his life.</p><p>He didn't really get why everyone else made it such a big deal. Within a day of meeting Jeff, he had made it some sort of big "gotcha". Like Abed didn't know that he was different. It was just part of his life, and he didn't really understand why everyone else wanted to get in on it. Why everyone wanted to be the one to tell him he wasn't normal. But there were a lot of things that Abed didn't really get about people.</p><p>That was why he liked Troy. Troy never sat him down and had the "there's this thing called autism..." talk. Troy didn't really care. Troy didn't mention that Abed ate buttered noodles five days a week. When Abed was having one of Those Days where he couldn't really talk much, Troy didn't make a big deal of it. He just kept talking to him as if everything was normal, because for them it was.</p><p>When there were days where executive dysfunction had Abed tight in his grip, barely able to roll over, Troy wouldn't be weird about it. He wouldn't use the condescendingly saccharine "I'm concerned about you" voice that everyone else liked to use on him (especially Britta). Troy would pull him out of the cycle of frustration with a "good morning" text, or later on, when they lived together, a bowl of cereal and an offer to watch cartoons together. </p><p>When Abed did mention his autism to Troy, he was never weird about it. He could make jokes, and Troy would laugh, but not the uncomfortable laugh that most people did when they were reminded of the existence of neurodivergence. Troy was genuine, and he telegraphed his emotions to excess naturally, so figuring out what he was feeling was never the draining task that it was with other people.</p><p>Abed understood Troy, and as far as he could tell, Troy understood Abed. And it was all a guy could ask for.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>